Don't Go Anywhere
by Ashleigh Crawley
Summary: After Mary visits her mama one morning for a talk after Matthew's death, Cora realizes the most important thing in her life is her husband.


**Don't Go Anywhere**

_Author's Note: Okay, this is angsty and I have absolutely no regrets, because I think that this must have happened at some point, maybe not exactly like this, but in some variation of this. Not to mention that I wanted to write this. I cried while writing it. Expect Cora/Robert feels, Mary/Matthew feels and hints at Sybil/Tom feels. Just expect feels in general, m'kay?_

"Mama, can I talk to you about something?" Mary asked, entering her mother's bedroom after breakfast one cold December morning.

"Of course you can dear," Cora replied, patting the side of the bed that Robert had left earlier to go down for breakfast, although he had said that he would have much rather stayed warm in bed with her. Mary sat down and looked at her mother.

"How are you supposed to feel when you lose the one you love?" she asked quietly, and Cora's face fell. Ever since Matthew's death, Mary had been down the entire time. She didn't smile or make snarky comments at Edith anymore. Her fire was gone.

"Well, Mary, the only two people I've lost that I was very close to were my father and Sybil," she said. "But when it comes to the love of your life, I honestly don't know."

"Of course, papa is still here," Mary replied, looking down at her hands. Cora reached over and took one of Mary's hands.

"Yes, he is," she replied. "You could ask your grandmothers, Isobel and even Tom about what it's like to lose the one love of your life, because they would be much more help than I could ever hope to be."

"What would you do if papa died?" Mary asked.

"I don't like to think of myself without him. I would be empty, so empty I would probably die. Your father is my life, I don't remember much of my life before him and I can't see me being without him after having him there for so long," Cora started. "I would never begin to recover, if I stayed alive without him, I would die in mourning and I would spend the rest of my life wishing for death."

"So, it's fine to remain like this," Mary said.

"No, it isn't healthy Mary, especially for someone as young as you. Look at Tom, he loved Sybil and he was heartbroken over her death, but he's come out of the dark and is doing quite well," she said. "That doesn't mean he doesn't miss her, it means that he knows that she would want him to be happy and not wish for him to shut the world out. Your father and I, well mostly me, I realized that Sybil wouldn't want your father and I to be pulled apart by her death and we've recovered from it. We still miss her with all our hearts, but we face it together. Matthew would want you to be happy. He wouldn't want this for you dearest."

"Alright," Mary said. "I suppose you're right Mama. Matthew wouldn't be against me missing him, but he'd want me to remember our happy days and cherish those and be happy in life." She gave her mother a small smile, and Cora smiled back at her.

A few moments later, Mary left her mother's bedroom. Cora thought for a moment and got off her bed and pulled her dressing gown, seeing if Robert was in his dressing room. He wasn't there, so she assumed that he was in the library. She didn't bother getting dressed, instead she left her bedroom and went downstairs to the library, smiling when she saw Robert sitting at his desk. She walked up to him and put her arms around him. Robert pulled up, startled, but not unhappy.

Why had Cora decided to come to the library without dressing first? Was something wrong? He got her to let go for a moment and he led her to _their _settee, sitting down on it, while Cora sat on his lap, wrapping her arms around him again. "Cora?" he asked. "Is something wrong?"

"Don't ever go anywhere," she whispered. "Promise me that. Promise me you'll never go anywhere?"

"Not even out on the estate?" he asked.

"No, don't go anywhere," she replied, holding him tighter in her arms.

"What's all this about Cora," he asked, taking her face in his hands and making him face her. He only noticed then that she was silently crying. "Darling. What's wrong?"

"I can't ever lose you and if I hold you in my arms, where you're safe, I won't lose you," she said. "So I have to hold on, or you might disappear."

"I'm not ever going to leave you," he said. "You can't be worried about that."

"No, I'm worried about you dying. You can't," she said. "Because I'm nothing without you. I can't live or function properly without you and the safety of your love protecting me from the cruel world we live in. I need you more than I need to eat, breathe and sleep. You're my everything, and if I lose you, not only will I have nothing, but I will be nothing."

"Cora, darling, what's brought this on?" he asked. "You've never been worried about this kind of thing before, or if you have been, you haven't spoken of it."

"No, it's just that Mary came to me this morning and asked how you're supposed to feel when you lose the one you love, and it made me think about how I would feel if I lost you," she said. "And I don't want you to go anywhere, not even out on the estate. Matthew was driving back here from the hospital and he got in that horrid car accident and he died. The world is a dangerous place and it will not take my entire world away from me."

Robert remained silent, thinking about how black his life would be if he had lost Cora when she had the Spanish Flu. He shuddered for a moment. "Cora, I hope you know that this means you and I will have to go at precisely the same second, because I couldn't live without you either." He smiled at her when she looked at him and gave him her most loving smile. The one that looked to him as if he had just given her the moon. He wrapped his arms around his wife tightly, not caring that if anyone entered the library, they would be wondering why they were holding each other and why Cora wasn't properly dressed. In that moment, he didn't care. He leaned into Cora gently and pressed his lips to her, silently promising to each other that whoever went first, would bring the other with them.


End file.
